BHARAT

UK. London. 2010. Community members leave the East London Mosque after Eid prayers. Combined with the adjoining London Muslim Centre, it is one of the largest mosques in the United Kingdom.

UK. London. 2011. Muslims, along-with members of Neturei-Karta, an organization of Orthodox Jews, protest outside the Israeli Embassy to mark the third anniversary of Israel’s attack on Gaza. Members of Neturei-Karta refuse to recognize the existence or authority of the ‘State of Israel’ and make a point of publicly demonstrating their position, the position of the Torah and authentic unadulterated Judaism.

USA. Bridgeview, Illinois. 2010. Amina Demir [left] and her younger sister were in their car when a middle-aged Caucasian male in a car next to them shouted, ‘sand nigger’ and drove away. Amina followed his car, noted the license plate number and reported him to the police. A local court later sentenced the man to 150 hours of community service.

UK. London. 2011. Iythar, an Egyptian-British fine artist, paints at her studio. One of her paintings [top-left] is titled, ‘The Way Sarkozy Intended It’. She said, “It is an interpretation of the burqa ban in France. It shows how the ban takes away the voice and identity of Muslim women, leaving them speechless and incomplete”.

USA. San Francisco, California. April, 2018. Basil Rizwan, 19, said, "This is my country; I was born and raised here. Questions around my religion or identity do bother me. But I can't understand why so many Americans hold uninformed opinions about Muslims when they can easily read about Islam or simply talk to a fellow American Muslim". Rizwan is the founder of a successful web and graphic design studio and he also dreams of becoming an actor someday

France. Marseille. 2014. Inside a room at an under-construction Islamic school building.

France. Marseille. 2014. Radia (center) with her daughter (left) and her friend (right) at her home in the 3rd arrondissement of Marseille.

France. Marseille. 2012. Abdel Benfrih [right] was trying to convince his uncle to let him drive the car but his uncle refused, as Abdel is a minor without a driving license. Abdel and his family lives in a cité – social housing project – in the northern 13th district of Marseille; an area notorious for its links to crime and violence.

UK. London. 2010. A young Muslim girl during a community fair.

USA. Oakland, California. March, 2018. Maya Shweiky (second from right), 27, a high school English teacher, interacts with her students during a class at the Fremont High School, East Oakland. More than eighty percent of the students at Fremont High School are from the Hispanic and African American population. On being asked why she chose to be a teacher at a school that is located in an impoverished and crime-ridden district, Maya said, "I wanted to serve the underserved. I wanted to be there for these kids who usually do not have access to people who care about them. These kids come with so much baggage, so much trauma. I wanted to help them realize that there is light at the end of tunnel, that there is hope for each and every one of them."

UK. Birmingham. 2011. Negar Yousafzai, a British Afghan, is an educated and well informed young woman. Here she asks, “Who wants to hear the social or political opinions of a veiled woman like me. They only want to see pictures of oppressed Afghan women”.

USA. Evanston, Illinois. 2010. Iqbal Shariff practices punch combinations at the Ultimate Fitness gymnasium. Iqbal said, “As a child I always thought that a situation similar to the French revolution would occur in my neighborhood and people will take over my house. I was very scared then and felt that I would lose everything because of being a Muslim.”

France. Marseille. 2013. A young boy feels homesick and spends some time alone in the backyard of his hostel. He had just spoken over the phone with his parents who live in the Republic of Guinea. The boy arrived in Marseille as an illegal immigrant but is now being looked after and supported by a private social organization.

UK. London. 2012. Muslim and non-Muslim members of a Sufi group perform a Zikr, a form of meditative chanting. The group said that in a Zikr, each member of the group tries to efface herself in the remembrance of Allah.

UK. London. 2012. Azad Ali presents his show ‘Your Views on the News’ on Islam Channel. In 2009, Ali was suspended from his job as a Treasury civil servant after a newspaper reported that Ali, on his blog, had advocated the killing of British soldiers in Iraq. Ali was later cleared by a Civil Service investigation into the allegations leveled against him. Ali said, “It was a difficult time. But I never lost hope. I always tell my three kids to work hard, with all their honesty and integrity and not to be affected by failures.” Ali holds a number of key positions today including the chair of the Muslim Safety Forum, leading its Counter Terrorism work-stream, in association with the UK Home Office, Police and Security Services.

UK. Sheffield. 2011. Nasima Akhtar [right], and her Hindu friend, Chaitali, get ready for a house party. Nasima said, “Our affection for each other keeps our friendship alive and we are least bothered about the differences between our religions”.

France. Marseille. 2014. A young couple embraces before retiring to their separate rooms in a shelter for homeless young men and women. 

France. Marseille. 2014. Outside a bar in Noailles.

UK. London. 2010. A young girl has her hand marked with henna for an Eid party at her house in Bricklane. Bricklane is a famous street in east London and is the heart of Bangladeshi Muslim community in England

UK. London. 2011. Ghost train and its passengers during an Islamic community fair.

France. Marseille. 2013. A large number of damaged or burnt vehicles can be found in and around the cités in Marseille. These are vehicles which had been stolen mainly to retrieve and sell valuable parts, and also for joyriding. Most of the stolen vehicles are often found abandoned at random locations or employed further for committing other crimes. They are also used for making false insurance claims or sold to unsuspecting customers.

France. Marseille. 2014. Sylvain Massoudi, 25, lights a candle at the Notre Dame de la Garde. Sylvain, an Iranian immigrant, lives in Marseille but had never been to the world famous basilica before.

France. Marseille. 2013. Drug peddling takes place quite openly in the cités. Sometimes, young dealers can be seen standing in front of the buildings. But most of the times, they use the stairways and portals of the social housing buildings to sell drugs. It protects them from being detected by the police and helps them to quickly hide their drugs in case of a raid.

France. Marseille. 2014. Inside a Lebanese restaurant.

USA. St. Joseph, Missouri. 2010. Deeba Safi prays at her house. Deeba and her husband, Ahmad, have been working with other Muslim families to establish the first Mosque in St. Joseph but have faced a lot of resistance from the local non-Muslims. [Update: The Mosque has been established and is now fully functional

France. Marseille. 2014. Ali, 22, works at a Pakistani restaurant. I had met Ali in 2012 when he had just arrived in Marseille from Pakistan via Iran. Ali’s parents helped him escape from his native village near Lahore when they found out that Ali’s uncles and cousins, in order to settle a long-running property dispute, were plotting to kill Ali. A trafficking agent got him out of Pakistan but abandoned him, and several others like him, in Iran. Ali was held in an Iranian jail for a few months before being sent to France. In France, a social organization helped him to acquire professional and language skills and later produced him in the court that granted him with a French nationality.

France. Marseille. 2014. Young men at cité Les Rosiers (City of Roses). Built in 1957 and infamous for drug trafficking and high crime rate, Les Rosiers has some of the oldest and dirtiest buildings in Marseille.

UK. London. 2011. A poster appealing to support Islamic Relief’s Orphan welfare program as seen in an underground market. Established in 1984 in Birmingham, UK, Islamic Relief is the largest West- based international Muslim relief and development non-government organization

UK. London. 2011. Muslim men's tunic shirts in a shop at an underground business center. Many Muslim scholars advise men to be as modest in their appearance as women. They suggest that men should not wear their shirts tucked in their pants and it should be loose fitting enough to conceal all parts of the body.

USA. Pleasanton, California. April, 2018. Dr. Umar Faruq Abd-Allah (center), 70, a world renowned Islamic scholar, speaks at an event at the MCC Mosque. Earlier this year, a report was published which revealed how, for more than a decade, several agencies and police departments have been unlawfully spying on Mosques and Islamic scholars in the USA. Security agencies have been implanting informants, known as Mosque crawlers, to spy on Mosque-goers and secretly record all talks and activities taking place inside a Mosque. This photograph taken with a partially obscured long-focus lens imitates the unethical and often illegal practice of surveillance photography in and around Mosques

UK. Middlesex. 2011. May Hnin Oo [left] and Guarbambee Win at the reception desk of a community event organized by the Burmese Muslim Association.

France. Marseille. 2014. Inside a café – cum – library young members of EuroPalestine, a pro-Palestine association, rehearse their acts and speeches a night before organizing a protest theater against Israel in downtown Marseille

France. Marseille. 2014. Inside his small room in a shelter for homeless young men, Daniel (standing), 19, gives a haircut to his friend, Mohamed Chérif Spiga. Daniel dreams of becoming a hairstylist and provides his services free of cost to all the residents of the shelter home.

France. Marseille. 2013. FadilaBenchouia kisses her son goodnight after reading a bedtime story to him. Fadila separated from her husband two years ago after he started drinking heavily and turned abusive. As a single parent, Fadila receives a number of social security benefits, but she still works at two different jobs in order to earn enough for her son’s education and future. Like a lot of single mothers that I met in Marseille, Fadila too expressed her fear and concerns about drugs, crime and violence in Marseille. Single-parent families make up more than 10% of all families in Marseille; three times more than anywhere else in France. In June this year, hundreds of citizens, many of them mothers, marched on the streets and demanded an end to the criminal violence that has brutally ended the lives of several young sons of Marseille.

France. Marseille. 2014. Mohamed Guelmani works to convert his attic into a bathroom. Guelmani is a professional social worker and a self-taught carpenter, plumber and painter. He often buys and renovates old dilapidated flats, and then resells them for a tidy profit

France. Marseille. 2013. Members of the French Comorian community were about to gather for a meeting in a café and one of the organizers here makes some quick last minute changes to the discussion points.

France. Marseille. 2014. Women prepare the traditional Algerian flatbread, Kesra, inside a shop at Noailles. Noailles is a neighborhood in the 1st arrondissement of Marseille located downtown near the Old Port. Noailles is famous for its old buildings, immigrant population and hundreds of shops selling North African food and other products like crafts and fabrics.

France. Marseille. 2013. SofiyanBenchouia [right] and his mother wait for our language translator at his apartment in a cité in the 13th district of Marseille. Sofiyan is a very good student and is preparing for his engineering entrance exams. His parents came from Oran, Algeria, to France in 1966 after the Algerian War. In her interview, Sofiyan’s mother said that she likes to live in Marseille and does not believe that there is racism or discrimination of any kind against Arabs in France. But Sofiyan holds a very different opinion. He said, “My mother never had to go out for work. Her social life is limited to the Algerian community in our neighborhood. How can she know what racism or discrimination is? Maybe you should ask my father who had to work for low paying jobs even after being highly qualified. Or wait till you hear what I have faced in schools and on the streets”.

USA. Menlo Park, California. April, 2018. Farah Yasmeen Shaikh (left), a Kathak dancer, rehearses a dance drama in her studio as Dr. Mathew Spangler (right), the playwright and director of the drama, takes notes. Farah's dance drama, The Forgotten Empress, narrates the story of Noor Jahan, a Muslim woman who was born in a refugee camp but rose to become a powerful Empress during the 17th century Mughal India. Farah, a widely acclaimed performer, is probably the only American Pakistani Muslim woman who chose to pursue Kathak dance as a lifelong career.

USA. Chapel Hill, North Carolina. 2011. Zaheer Abbas said, “I’m philosophically agnostic and politically an anarchist. So I guess that makes me a ‘bad’ Muslim and a ‘bad’ liberal. My wife jokingly calls me ‘Papa Bear’, but every time we fly back to the US from India, she insists that I shave my full beard so that we don’t have to wait too long at security checks at the US airports”.

France. Marseille. 2013. Young men, who work for drug dealers, photographed while being interviewed on the 7th floor of a social housing building. The man on the left did the talking while the one in the center, who identified himself as Laglu, kept a watch on all movements nearby. Laglu, aged 22, was arrested a couple of weeks later and is now in prison after being convicted for a number of illegal activities. The right side of the wall was once a door to a flat, which was later sealed by the police after an entire family was murdered there by a rival drug gang. In memory of the slain family, young men from the building chiseled their own names and heart shapes on the cement. The word at the bottom of the wall reads ‘Bisous’, meaning ‘kisses’ in French

USA. Pleasanton, California. April, 2018. Seen through an Andalusian Arts calendar, students memorize the Quran at the Muslim Community Center.

France. Marseille. 2014. A young man at a kebab shop. 

UK. Slough. 2011. KelekeAnyabwile [right], during her wedding. Keleke's family migrated to England from The Republic of Trinidad and Tobago. Her father, Shaykh Hasan [not seen here], is an Islamic leader of the local Afro-Caribbean Muslim Community.

UK. London. 2010. A man walks past a poster at the Global Peace and Unity event. The British government boycotted the biennial event claiming that many extremist groups were also participating and funding the event.

USA. Pleasanton, California. 2018. A teacher (center) with a student during a Sunday Quran class while her son (left) waits for her.

France. Marseille. 2013. Children of a Comorian family listen to their mother [not in the picture] as she talks about her experience of living in Marseille. The family, living in an old social housing apartment, has eleven children; the eldest child is 16-years old and the youngest one is 15-months old.

USA. Fremont, California. 2018. Jehan Hakim, 37, helps her 5-year-old son, Idrees Mubarez, to complete his school homework at their home. Jehan is a Community Advocate with the National Security and Civil Rights Program at the Asian Law Caucus (ALC). She has collaborated with numerous organizations in the Bay Area to support AMEMSA (Arab, Middle-Eastern, Muslim, South Asian) communities by providing Arabic translation, educational workshops on Islamophobia, Know Your Rights, and voter registration drives. She believes the US National security agenda exacerbates Islamophobia. In an interview last year, she said, "When the government is allowed to ostracize and isolate a community due to their identity, this is an explicit push to promote othering, which in this case, results in Islamophobia. The National Security Agency (NSA) has not only systematically cultivated Islamophobia but has helped to proliferate and mainstream Islamophobia."

USA. Oakland, California. March, 2018. Community members greet each other outside the Lighthouse Mosque. The Lighthouse Mosque building, located in an African American neighborhood, once used to be a Black Panther Party community center. Imam Zaid Shakir, a renowned Islamic scholar, founded the Lighthouse Mosque in 2007.

USA. Napa, California. April, 2018. Corporal Omar Salem (foreground), 32, leads a SWAT training scenario exercise with other officers from the Napa police department. Cpl. Salem, who joined the Napa PD in 2007, has been recognized by his peers and the public for his contributions to not only the department but the community as well. A practicing Muslim, Cpl. Salem said, "People often stereotype Muslims and portray us as militants. But Islam has taught me to be a positive, helpful and giving human being. And it was my religion that inspired me to become a police officer and serve my community."

USA. Santa Clara, California. March, 2018. The Muslim Community Association organized a women-only event and panel discussion titled 'Making Herstory'. The event brought together on stage a group of professionally successful and inspirational Muslim women who shared their life stories, experiences, and answered questions from an audience of Muslim women.

France. Marseille. 2013. SalihaSadelli [right], a private nurse, talks to her patient during a home visit.

USA. Chapel Hill, NC. 2011. Ali Kadivar [left] plays a setar as his friend, Lukas Sherry, joins him at their apartment. Ali, an Iranian, said, “The image that the Western media presents of Iran, as conservative, backward, and homogeneous, is distorted and false. No doubt the Iranian government is oppressive and tries to impose a conservative life style on the Iranian population. But there are many pro-democracy Iranian citizens who defy this imposed life style everyday, in the way they dress, through the kind of books, movies, music, and art they create or consume.” Ali is a PhD student at the University of North Carolina.

UK. London. 2012. Students at the Alif Academy, an Islamic primary school, which is fighting a legal battle against its local council. The school is registered with the Department for Education (DfE) and has permission to operate. But the council has issued an enforcement notice against Alif Academy claiming that they do not have planning permission to operate as a school. The school, on the other hand, claims that it has a lot of evidence to prove that the council is acting Islamophobic. [Update: A legal public hearing was held and the council lost its case. The school is now free to operate]

France. Marseille. 2013. A young man tries to impress with his soccer skills on a street in Le Panier district. Le Panier, the oldest part of Marseille, is where the Greeks first settled and founded the city of Massalia some 2600 years ago. Since then, Le Panier has witnessed several waves of immigrations. Initially, the Italians and Corsicans settled here, then came the Maghrebis, and more recently the Vietnamese and the Comorians. There was also a time when Le Panier was viewed as a hurdle in the modernization of Marseille. Authorities saw it as a hill crowded with immigrants and dilapidated houses. But Le Panier developed at a pace and mood of its own, and still carries imprints of the successive cultures that gave its narrow streets their Provençal color and allure.

France. Marseille. 2014. Near the Town Hall Square.

France. Marseille. 2013. Friends of a young dress designer [not in the picture] wait for their car after finishing a photo shoot for the designer’s catalogue. The girls are wearing traditional hand-made Algerian wedding dresses. Such dresses are elaborately designed to represent the Algerian custom of treating the bride as a princess in her new kingdom.

France. Marseille. 2013. Nassurdine Haidari [left], 35, spends some time with his family during a lunch break from his office, which is just across the street from where he lives. Haidari, a member of the Socialist Party, is a deputy mayor for youth and sport for the 1st and 7th arrondissements of Marseille. French-born Haidari’s parents came from Comoros Islands off Africa’s east coast and he grew up in one of the poorest neighborhoods in Marseille. Haidari is an active campaigner of equal rights and social inclusion. Last year, Haidari was attacked and beaten by 20 men wearing masks and helmets as he was campaigning with community members during the French presidential election. But Haidari remains undeterred and hasn’t stopped working against issues of discrimination and rising inequality. As Haidari stated during his interview, “We have two fights to win. Against racism and Islamophobia. Because we are black and we are Muslims”.

UK. London. 2011. A young man walks past a mural at Princelet street, near Bricklane. Bricklane is a famous street in east London and is the heart of Bangladeshi Muslim community in England.

USA. Fremont, California. April, 2018. Three-year-old, Dua Safi (right) at her grandmother's home.

UK. London. 2011. Rezia Halima Wahid [right] and her 3-year old daughter, Noorie, at Rezia's studio. Rezia is a textile artist and creates hand-woven textiles. Rezia said, “Islam is a part of me, my existence, but my spirituality is something very personal. My identity as an artist is equally important and I want to be recognized for my work”.

France. Marseille. 2013. IlhemHachemi [right], 30, travels with her mother to downtown Marseille from La Rose, the northernmost metro station.

France. Marseille. 2013. Sofia [left] and Fatima had to wait for more than an hour before Sofia’s brother could finish work and come to pick them up from a shopping mall. The northern districts of Marseille, where a majority of the city’s Muslim population resides, are poorly connected by public transportation.

UK. London. 2011. Eid Fair at the Fryant Country Park.

UK. Brighton. 2012. Rida Awan [right] and her husband, Omar, share a quiet moment at the Brighton beach on a cloudy Sunday afternoon.

France. Marseille. 2014. Malika Ibrahima with her boyfriend, Mathieu Cocly, at La Roseraie, an emergency shelter home for unemployed homeless young people.

UK. Middlesex. 2012. Imran Hussain [centre], practices classical singing with his students at a park near his home. Hussain said, “I prefer to teach my students outdoors, in a natural surrounding, because nature’s silence amplifies the melody in our music”.

France. Marseille. 2014. Camille (right), a convert to Islam, enjoys the view atop the hill of Notre Dame de la Garde. On being asked why she embraced Islam, she said, “A few years ago, while walking I saw many Muslim men praying on the side of a busy street. I saw then calm and lost in their prayers in spite of the heavy traffic and blaring car horns. On one hand, I was touched to witness their devotion and on the other, I felt sad to see them worshipping under such non-sacred conditions. Something inside me changed that day and it encouraged me to walk towards Islam”.

USA. Livermore, California. 2018. A group of female students walk around the Five Pillars Farm Islamic graveyard during a lecture titled, 'Visit to the Graveyard & Gravesite Reminders'. The lecture was taught by a renowned Islamic scholar, Imam Tahir Anwar (not in the picture), who spoke about the do's and don'ts in an Islamic graveyard, and how a dead body and its final resting place should be treated with utmost respect.

France. Marseille. 2013. Omar Farhoune [right], 17, travels to Frioul Islands, a tourist destination located approximately 4 km from Marseille. Omar arrived in Marseille in early 2013 from Barcelona, Spain, with his father. Due to the economic crisis, Omar’s father was laid-off from work and after being unable to pay their mortgage, they lost their home too. Seeking work and shelter, both of them came to France where they were supported by a social organization that managed to find a job for Omar’s father. They have now moved into a rented apartment.

France. Marseille. 2013. Mehdy Bibi [left] meets his girlfriend at Notre-Dame de la Garde. They have known each other for five years and want to get married. But their families, for reasons undisclosed, have been opposing their marriage and have asked both of them to end their relationship.

France. Marseille. 2014. Isa (standing) and his two daughters take a break during their first visit to the MuCem (Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilizations.

France. Marseille. 2014. Soccer and candy apples at a social housing building compound.

France. Marseille. 2014. A child slides down the stairs at a street in the 3rd arrondissement. Home to a very large and diverse immigrant population, the 3rd arrondissement is known for its deprivation and increasing poverty in comparison with other parts of Marseille. With very high unemployment rates, old run-down housing and low levels of education, the population of this district is much poorer than the average, even by Marseille standards.

France. Marseille. 2013. Samra, 19, listens to her 70-year old father, Mohammed Gacem, as he tells her what all he wants to do when he feels better and is able to walk on his own again. Due to old age, Mohammed has lost much strength and falls sick quite often. He needs constant care but the family couldn’t afford to keep him in a hospital or pay for a home caregiver. Mohammed’s three sons from his first marriage are all married and live separately. So Samra, a daughter from his second marriage, decided to take a year off from studies and stay at home to look after her old father. A private nurse visits them twice a week. But Samra monitors her father’s daily medication, helps him with light exercises and provides constant companionship.

France. Marseille. 2013. WafaaAllal, 33, works as a part-time Arabic teacher conducting classes at the basement of an Islamic library. She is a single mother and has a 7-year old daughter. Wafaa has a Master’s degree in Translation [Arabic, Spanish & English] and has been trying to get a job for the past 5 years. She received quite a few job offers from many private firms. But they all wanted her to work without her hijab, which she wasn’t ready for. Fed up with the situation, she no longer sends out job applications and now teaches at a low-paying Islamic library for just two days a week.

UK. London. 2011. Ustad Hajji Ameer Khan [standing] says a prayer before he and his team leaves for a musical performance. Khan is a Qawwal, a Sufi devotional musician.

France. Marseille. 2014. At a friend’s apartment in cité les Lauriers in 13th arrondissement.

France. Marseille. 2013. Squatting in a social housing apartment, young men watch a soccer match on TV.

USA. Chicago, Illinois. 2010. Eric Bhaimia stops for directions at the N. Wells Bridge. “I do not come to this part of the city often as I always feel that I am lost in this crowd of people”, he said.

France. Marseille. 2013. Moonrise, as seen from Les Eglantiers, one of the many social housing buildings in the northern 13th arrondissement of Marseille. These buildings were constructed in late 60s and early 70s to accommodate immigrant communities, especially Maghrebis, in France. While they did succeed, to an extent, in providing low-income families with a shelter, this system has also led to the creation of several ghettos. In these ghettos, especially in the North, marginalized population suffers from neglect, massive unemployment, drugs and crime, away from the rich gentrified Southern Marseille.

USA. Napa, California. 2018. Corporal Omar Salem (left), 32, responding to an abandoned vehicle complaint, inspects a truck after questioning a nineteen-year old male (right) who with his girlfriend (not seen) was found inside the truck. Cpl. Salem, a practicing Muslim, is viewed upon as a role model by young members of the Bay Area Islamic community. He specializes in Spanish community outreach and is the co-founder of Legacy Youth Project, a program that supports 'at-risk' youth in Napa to build positive characters and excel in academics.

France. Marseille. 2014. Sisters share a joke outside The Grand Littoral shopping center.

USA. San Francisco, California. 2018. Basil Rizwan, 19, at Pier 1, The Embarcadero, during a visit with friends to the tourist hotspots of San Francisco.

France. Marseille. 2014. In front of an old social housing building at Busserine quarters in the 14th arrondissement. The neighborhood, labeled as a Sensitive Urban Zone, is one of the fourteen sites for the Marseille Urban Renovation project where a few decrepit social housing buildings are being replaced with new ones.

France. Marseille. 2014. Young men honing their soccer skills outside a social service office at cité les Flamants in the 14th arrondissement. This neighborhood has been identified as one of the fourteen sites for the Marseille Urban Renovation project where a few decrepit social housing buildings are being replaced with new colorful ones.

USA. Columbia, Missouri. 2010. Caitlyn Green [right], and her friend photographed in a field. Caitlyn lives in a small town and converted to Islam more than two years ago. But her catholic mother and relatives do not accept her conversion. Caitlyn said, “People ask me whether a hijab on my head makes me feel uncomfortable. Actually, wearing the hijab is not difficult if people around you understand your religion. Since they cannot accept me with a hijab, it does get difficult for me”.

France. Marseille. 2014. Picking fresh flowers in the morning

France. Marseille. 2013. Yusra, Sofia and Camelia were my city guides during my initial days in Marseille. They helped me to know more about their city, and also convinced some of their friends to participate in my project. This photograph was taken one evening on small hill outside Marseille where the girls rested for a while before driving me back to my apartment.

France. Marseille. 2014. Leslie Diebel, with her son Adam Belaadi (left), soaks up the sun at the beach near Promenade Georges Pompidou.

France. Marseille. 2014. Young men at a technical training center run by Adelies, a social organization. Many of the students at Adelies are juvenile delinquents coming from difficult and diverse backgrounds. Adelies provides them with language, mathematics, computer and technical skills to help them succeed in professional environments. Using an approach of prevention, mediation and training, Adelies works with families, educational institutes and directly with young men and women on the streets to prevent their exclusion, anti-social behavior and conflicts.

France. Marseille. 2014. A student at an Islamic school in Marseille.

France. Marseille. 2014. A young man and his blue-and-gold macaw in a street near Place Jean Jaurès.

France. Marseille. 2014. A young man does a wheelie in a narrow street even as his friend (hand) warns him of a fast approaching car behind his scooter. A youngster performing a wheelie is such a common sight in Marseille that many people jokingly describe it as the ‘national sport of Marseille’

France. Marseille. 2014. A child plays in the courtyard of Agora Centre, a social development organization located in quartier Busserine, 14th arrondissement of Marseille. For a number of reasons, including high crime and violence, Busserine and nearby areas have been identified as ‘Sensitive Urban Zones’ by the French government.

USA. Manteca, California. April, 2018. Maryam Haider (right) takes a break from her mobile food truck that she had set up during the Crossroads Street Faire in Downtown, Manteca. Maryam and her friend, RahelaQari (left), together have invested more than sixty thousand dollars since last year to start a new food truck business. But it hasn't been easy; they have been dealing with a lot of operational difficulties and are barely breaking even.

UK. London. 2011. Members of a role-play team after their act at a local community event at London, UK. The play was a fictional narration of the many problems that the present day young Muslims face [right] and how they could live a better life by following the examples of ancient Islamic leaders [left].

UK. London. 2010. From left, Minhaj, Ashiq, Shofique and Abid pictured just before they left London to attend a gathering on ‘Islam and Young Muslims’ at Birmingham, UK.

USA. Chicago. 2010. Kaiser Aslam sketches the Chicago city skyline at the Ohio Street beach, as his art sheets fly around. Kaiser said, “It's not easy. There are a lot of temptations in this society but it’s my faith in Allah, and His blessings that shield me from all wrongdoings”.